Cattle Baron Needs a Bride Read online

  “Then I guess we can call it therapeutic?” she answered breezily.

  “Zara!” he admonished. “Let’s get to the most important thing of all. How badly did she upset you? I didn’t hear all of it.”

  “You could hear what she called me, surely? Trouble with a capital T. And something about I had it coming Big Time. I hardly know the woman. Yet she appears to hate me. I’m only grateful she didn’t resort to some choice four-letter words.”

  He gave her such an understanding smile that it turned her aching heart over. “Actually, she did too. I wouldn’t have thought she knew half of them. I had to read her the riot act. My good pal Nick looked stunned so she’s been keeping the bad language under wraps. You know, you’d never recognize Nick from the man he is on the polo field. All in all, it took much longer than we hoped before she was out for the count. Poor old Sal!’

  She couldn’t control her tongue. It was that sort of night. “Hell!” She, who rarely swore, decided to give way to a few swear words herself. “Poor old Sal be damned! It was okay to ignore me. Why am I never poor old Zara? It’s getting to bug me. You’d think I’d spent my life having the greatest fun, adored by all. Well, I was a victim. You met my father.” She pulled back, ashamed of herself. “Anyway, poor old Sal is just down the corridor. You can drop in in the morning to check on her. I’m sure she’s expecting it.”

  He used his long-fingered tanned hands in a truly Gallic gesture of frustration. Let Nick worry about his wife. His hunger was for Zara, the rapturous pleasure and the enormous comfort her body offered. His driving need was increasing by the nanosecond. Couldn’t she see that? “Look, Zara, I know what you’ve been through.”

  “No, you don’t!” She was trying desperately to retain her cool. “You only think you know.” No way could she throw a blue fit like Sally. She wasn’t going to mention the letters either. She just had to live with it.

  “Well, at least allow me to apologise for not getting back sooner when you obviously needed me,” Garrick said. “But I assure you I’m in no hurry to see Sally again.”

  “What? You think they’re going to start over in Zimbabwe?” she mocked. “I’d say you’ve had a lucky break.”

  His blue eyes had the flash of the finest sapphires. “So maybe I feel a bit guilty for dropping Nick in it,” he said. “I must be stupid but I thought they would make a go of it. But forget that. They have to solve their own problems. Is it possible that you, of all people, are jealous?” He spoke softly, tauntingly, coming towards her with a natural male grace that could only be called sinuous, like a big purring cat.

  There was no question he wanted her. He was powerfully aroused. “I don’t think jealous is the word,” she said, savouring her moment of female ascendancy. “I can’t say exactly how I feel. Maybe piqued? Will that do?”

  He reached her, pulling her into his arms in his wonderful unique way. “Piqued? Not a word you hear often,” he observed, staring down into her face. “You were such a beautiful child, you would have dazzled Heaven,” he murmured. “The sweetest little girl in the world. My girl. I want a daughter in your image. Two or three daughters, if you like. Our son and heir. I wouldn’t ask any woman to run a vast cattle station. Why don’t we go to bed? I adore the scent of you. It’s like a lovely cloud around us.”

  “Go to bed. That’s the answer, is it?” She tossed her head on its long graceful neck, determined to play out her moment. “You’re very proud of your virility, aren’t you, Garrick Rylance? It would reduce any woman to begging. You’re really a paragon of masculinity. And a glorious lover. But Sal would know all about that. I have to step back from that one. What if she shows up?” She arched back against his encircling arm, feeling his strength, knowing he was only using minuscule effort. “She could well fall into a stupor for an hour or two, then get her second wind.”

  “You are jealous!” His eyes were glowing electric-blue flame.

  There was such an element of satisfaction, even triumph in his voice that it only increased her desire to hold out. “I am not!” She couldn’t completely claim that. She was more than aware of the fundamental insecurity in her. Maybe she was the one who needed the therapy?

  He started to use the pads of his thumbs on her erect nipples.

  “Oh…oh…. oh…!”

  She was totally exposed for the fraud she was. This was a man who could make her laugh, make her cry buckets, as she had done in the past. Now she was pierced by a Cupid’s arrow of exquisite sensation. It was so ravishing it was hardly to be borne without giving way to involuntary moans.

  “I think you are and I love it! My Zara is jealous!”

  He was just too sure of himself. “Just you slow down, Garrick,” she warned, truly flustered. Whether he did or he didn’t, the fact remained, the core of her body had turned liquid. “I want to talk—” Truth was, talk was less on the agenda with every passing second. “If you think I’m going to—”

  “Oh, you’re going to all right!” he vowed, bending his dark head all the way over her, kissing her open mouth, his tongue moving into the moist clean interior.

  His power was too terrible at times, she thought dazedly. She couldn’t hope to win any sort of battle of the sexes. No wonder she was worried about it. While she gasped with the rapture he seemed hell-bent on giving her, he began to rain kisses all over her face, moving down her throat to the cleft between her breasts. She was growing giddy with excitement, her legs and thighs trembling so much she needed his arms to support her.

  “Oh, I want you,” he muttered. He sounded for all the world like a man drunk on a woman’s beauty. “I want you in every conceivable way. I want to mate with you, Zara. Just like the black swans on Coorango’s lagoons. For life. I’ll never let you go now you’ve given yourself back to me. You know it. I know it. That’s it as far as I’m concerned. No about turns from you ever again. When I’m with you I’m a whole man. And you, my love, are a pearl beyond price.”

  What thinking woman would possibly argue with that?

  By late afternoon of the following day guests and spectators had begun their trek home, with the exception of Sally and Nick Draper. Sally had woken up with a fearful headache and, doctored up with painkillers, returned to bed until well after lunch.

  “Sally would like to have a word with you,” Helen whispered after Garrick and Nick had gone out to the four-wheel drive for the short drive to the airstrip. “I expect she wants to apologise. She seems very contrite.”

  “I expect she doesn’t remember much about it,” Zara said, unable to find it in her heart to rehash Sally’s offensive time out. “Where is she?”

  “Still in her room. Poor girl needs privacy.”

  And a supply of major tranquillisers, Zara thought. “I’ll go up.”

  “Don’t worry, dear. It will be short and sweet. Nick is terribly mortified. He wants to get away.” Helen had a sardonic glint in her eye. “Get away home, I mean.”

  Sally was waiting inside the beautiful guest bedroom. She had her back to Zara, staring out over the extensive rear gardens with their magnificent date palms, bold architectural yuccas, the virtually indestructible New Zealand flax with their tall flower spikes and dozens of oleanders in fragrant drought-resistant bloom, white, pink apricot, yellow and all the crimsons. A dazzling show!

  “Helen said you wanted to have a word,” Zara called as pleasantly as she could. Last night wasn’t the first disastrous encounter she had lived through and it wouldn’t be her last. People were notorious for becoming irresponsible under the influence of alcohol.

  Sally digested this without turning. “I—meant—every—word—I—said.”

  Sucked in, Zara thought with a rush of dismay and self-disgust. “I’d hoped you wouldn’t remember anything, Sally, you’d had so much to drink.”

  “Ah, Princess Perfect!” Sally sneered. “The aristocrat! The Rylance heiress! You can never be sure who cares about you or your money.” Abruptly she turned. She looked unwell, her expression bitter an
d, it had to be said, humiliated. Still, she was ready to carry on the fight. “I’m no good with the booze.”

  Understatement, Zara thought. “Listen, Sally. I don’t want any more unpleasantness. You go on your way. I’ll go mine.”

  “God, you must know you’ll never go the distance?” Sally said, collapsing into an armchair. “This will never be your world.”

  Zara gave her a long focused look. “You don’t know me, Sally, so I place no value on your opinion. In any case, it’s none of your business. I know you’re in torment but you can’t blame me. I’ve made lots of mistakes and had to pay for it. That’s the way of it!”

  “Spare me the philosophising,” Sally retorted with a great deal of feeling. “Has he asked you to marry him? Tell me,” she burst out, rocking back and forth.

  “Oh, Sally!” Zara was filled with pity. “Why are you doing this to yourself?”

  “Tell me, goddamnit!”

  A cool refreshing breeze wafted in from outside, perfumed by the oleanders. It gave Zara some much needed comfort. “Sally, I don’t have to tell you anything. You really ought to talk to someone about your problem. You must know you have one.”

  A bitter spark fired Sally’s hazel eyes. “The problem is and was you,” she said with great conviction. “You destroyed my life’s dream. And another thing—I hate the fact that you’re a Rylance.”

  Zara looked away. There was no point whatever in staying. “Sally, I’m going downstairs,” she said quietly. “I don’t have to listen to this.” Through long experience, she was able to retain her extraordinary calm.

  She was at the door when Sally’s voice stopped her in her tracks. “I mean you’re none too stable, are you? Garrick told me all about your mother. Said you’re the image of her. You know, super-sensitive, nerve-ridden! Committed suicide, didn’t she, your mother? That’s quite a dangerous genetic trait to have in the family. What might you do if your life crumbled?”

  Grief she’d had to learn to live with stirred to full life. “I don’t believe for one minute Garrick spoke to you about my mother. He wouldn’t do that. So don’t waste your time trying to come between us. Garrick and I will marry. It’s what we both want. So let go, Sally. Get help if you can’t do it on your own. Even if I weren’t in the picture and Nick wasn’t either, Garrick wouldn’t return to you. There’s only one conclusion regarding your short-lived engagement. You weren’t really suited.”

  Sally, full of fury and a terrible ache, once more reacted violently. She shot out of the armchair, staggered once, made a grab for the nearest ornament to hand. “Ask Garrick if you’re so sure of him,” she shouted. “Go on, if you dare, you pathetic trusting bitch. Ask him.” The challenge rang out at the same moment that Sally pitched the objet d’art, a beautiful little white porcelain swan on its mirror-topped ormolu base.

  Zara, trembling in reaction, threw herself sideways but the beautiful little missile did find a target.

  Helen. She had heard Sally’s explosive cry, prompting her to run the rest of the way down the corridor.

  The porcelain swan hit her fair and square on the left temple. She gasped at the blow, the sheer shock of it, lurching sideways towards Zara, who caught her, putting protective arms around her.

  “Get out of here, Sally.” Zara drew herself up like an avenging angel. “Go now. You were in enough trouble without this.”

  Sally looked devastated. “It was meant for you. Never Mrs Rylance.”

  “You heard me. Go now. Your husband is waiting for you. Tell Garrick he’s to come right away. Nick can take the jeep to the airstrip.”

  A short mad laugh broke from Sally’s pale lips. “I can’t take a trick, can I?”

  “I said, go!”

  “That’s one screwed up young woman,” Helen observed when she felt able. “That was eighteenth century Meissen, you know.” She gazed down at the shattered swan. “I never figured Sally Draper for a dangerous woman.”

  “Unhappiness has unhinged her.” Zara was staring in dismay at the still rising lump on Helen’s forehead. It was a miracle she hadn’t received the full impact right in the eye. As it was, she felt certain Helen would develop a black eye.

  Helen started to say something when they heard fast-moving footsteps along the corridor before Garrick burst through the open doorway, his brilliant eyes sweeping over his mother, sitting pale but upright in an armchair with an obviously concerned Zara bending over her. “Good God!” His eyes settled on the lump on his mother’s head. “What’s happened here? Ellie, are you all right?” He went to her, going down on one knee. “Ellie?” He adored his mother. The best mother a man could ever have.

  “I’m perfectly all right, darling,” Helen said, summoning up a soothing smile.

  “You need an ice pack and a couple of painkillers; I’ll get them,” Zara said.

  “There should be some in the bathroom cabinet.” Helen looked up.

  Zara disappeared into the dressing room and, from there, into the en suite bathroom.

  Garrick’s angry eyes moved from his mother, who was looking in charge of herself, albeit a bit shaken, to the smashed swan. “Isn’t that Meissen?”

  “It is,” Helen confirmed wryly. “A lovely thing. We’ve had it since forever. I never thought one day I’d get creamed with it.”

  “Oh, God!” Garrick groaned, thrusting a hand through his thick coal-black hair. “Sally ran out to the jeep like a bat out of hell. Said I was wanted here. No word of explanation. Yelled at Nick to take off. God!” he exclaimed. “Did she do this?”

  “Silly question, darling. It certainly wasn’t Zara.”

  Garrick’s black brows drew together. “It was meant for Zara. You just happened to get in the way.” No question—a statement.

  “Ran into it,” Helen said, accepting two painkillers and a glass of water from the returning Zara.

  “Are you okay?” Garrick’s blue eyes flashed up to her.

  She nodded. In the bush she had learned that one accepted things heroically, or as near as one could get.

  “Well, as okay as she could be under the circumstances.” Helen frowned, then winced at the stab of pain. “I started to get anxious. Sally was supposed to be making her apologies. At least that’s what she told me. I came up to hurry things along.”

  “Don’t talk now, Ellie,” Garrick told his mother. “That’s going to turn black and blue. You won’t be able to disguise it. What can we tell Dad?”

  “I know—” Zara offered a possible explanation “—you were in the mud room putting something away. One of the upper doors sprang open and the knob—they’re fairly big and heavy—hit you on the side of the head. The upper doors are about in line with your eyes.”

  Garrick considered. “Plausible enough, I suppose. Dad would never dream anyone would attack Ellie. He’ll be upset, but he knows better than anyone that freak accidents happen.”

  “I’d say we’ll have fewer with Sally Draper gone,” said Zara with uncharacteristic astringency. “I think you should lie down, Helen. Give the tablets time to work. I’ll get you an ice pack.”

  “Yes, do that.” Garrick helped his mother out of the armchair, keeping his arm around her. “Thanks, Zara. This is all my fault in a way.” He gave a self-lacerating groan. “Sally was just a time bomb waiting to go off.”

  “Not your fault, darling!” Helen told her son firmly, using his tall strong body for support. “Sally is the one with the problem. I have to say, after this weekend I really don’t care how she goes about solving it.”

  A full complement was out for the big pre-Christmas muster. The day had begun well before dawn but Zara was showered, dressed and breakfasted not that long after she heard the clatter of the choppers carrying in the pure desert air. Three helicopters would be in operation. The Bell belonging to the station and the two very experienced hired operators flying the relatively small two-seater Robinsons, cheaper to buy and maintain than the Bell. The big cattle stations like Coorango and others of the Channel Country with
their million plus acres always used helicopters for mustering, such were the vast distances and areas of wild bush where the cleanskins liked to take cover. There would still be at least a half dozen stockmen on the ground to walk the mobs. Stockmen were essential to achieve a clean muster and control the herd. Garrick would be flying the Bell. A mustering pilot who also had extensive ground experience was by far the most efficient. These were the pilots who had a solid understanding of the way livestock behaved. No one knew Coorango’s great herd better than Garrick.

  Zara watched proceedings from her vantage point on the Udalla escarpment. The fronds of palm trees fell in long cooling shadows over her. The whole area was covered with small stones and some extraordinary burnt sienna boulders sitting one on top of the other with spent woody fibres lying on the sand around them and a thick ground cover of tiny yellow flowers that bore a strong citrusy scent in the shade. A couple of rock wallabies that favoured heights had come to join her, unafraid. It appeared she gave off no aura of menace.

  The whole business of mustering had always fascinated her. Though not born to station life, it had struck a chord in her which would have confounded Sally. She had always loved Coorango. Loved the bush, the natural world, the wilderness, the extraordinary colourations in the vast landscape. Even the fiery red of the earth was incredible. She had thought it would be wonderful to be in a position to follow her lifelong desire to paint. People who knew good art had assured her she had a real gift. Her father had made endless fun of her artistic aspirations. Though it wasn’t fun. More like a withering contempt. Her father had been such a strange man. She didn’t think she would ever be able to talk about the crippling effect he’d had on her. Corin, her brother, knew. Garrick didn’t know anywhere near enough.

  Well, he didn’t read the letters, did he?

  Impossible to overstate the consequences of that. Her father had always maintained the public pretence that his daughter was his “princess”. A fiction.